Day 34-A Bit of a Downward Spiral

So, our poor baby love has suffered some slings and arrows in the last 24 hours, among these are:

1. Another pneuothorax (seems to be improving now that a new chest tube has been put in to replace the one he had removed only yesterday morning)

2. A possible infection (he had a touch of a fever and his white blood cell count was up a bit--they've sent off cultures to see what could be going on)

3. High heart rate in response to the high-fi oscillating ventilator

4. He's at the max of oxygen flow and nitric oxide, and reporting oxygen saturations in the low 90s (better than where he was last night, when his sats were in the low 80s)


Currently, he's in a precariously stable place with his vitals, but it's not the reassuring stability we knew on ECMO. Isn't that funny? Who knew we would ever look back on those days with wistful eyes?

The main issue is the ventilator he's on--the high pressures necessary to keep his lungs inflated are wreaking havoc with his heart rate. He must come off of this ventilator in order to keep his recover moving forward.

If Rafa has ever strayed from your thoughts because you thought he was in a safer place (as we did for a while), please refocus them. He needs our re-commitment to all things TEAM RAFA!

The chant:

Stable, stable,

Hold that O!

Stable, stable,

Hold that O!

We'll let you know what today holds--we have faith that God and you all are with our baby boy...